Imam Al-Hujjah Hospital received an emergency for a woman in her 40s suffering from first-time symptoms of shortness of breath and fatigue.
Interventional cardiologist Sami Saad explains: “We sent the patient for a CT scan to identify the problem. The results showed that she had a pulmonary embolism and we prescribed her the appropriate medications. However, we had doubts that the patient may have a septal defect (a hole in the heart) so we performed an interventional echocardiogram which revealed a small congenital heart defect. The patient wasn’t aware of her condition but she didn’t need surgical intervention.”
Dr. Sami adds: “The symptoms were caused by the pulmonary embolism, and we discovered the septal defect by chance.”
